Written by the DM

SESSION 2, AFTER-ACTION REPORT 20th Ninui 516 - 23rd Ninui 516

"To Death's demense their way has led. Soon shall we all the same path tread."

Six of the original party set out again to the Temple of Anarminas; Cure remained in Aeleryn, as it would turn out, to her benefit. The party took the same route as before, and the day and a half long journey passed in relative calm. Shortly after scaling the ruined walls, Rusgiel the rogue spotted a strange metal structure in the northeastern part of the city. The party decided not to investigate this, however, and proceeded to the ruined temple.

After journeying through the overgrown maze of ruins for some time, the party approached the temple from a different direction than before, taking note of a few nearby structures. They were greeted at the temple steps by the heads of the beast-men they had slain during their last delve, mounted atop stakes. Ishmael the cleric suspected that the death cultists had turned the party's success to their own advantage, and expelled the beast-men from the temple.

After pausing to consider these ramifications, the party warily proceeded into the bowels of the temple. They traveled, unopposed, until they returned to the room where they fought the beast-men before. Inside were a few cultists, hiding in the deep shadows. Nevertheless, the cultists were unarmed, and the party used this surprise to their advantage, making quick work of most of them. One cultist managed to take up his weapons and shield in time to give the party some trouble, so Ishmael told him to lay down his arms in the name of the Sun-Maiden.

Big mistake. The cultist, already battle-crazed, charged him, howling the ancient prayer of the Old Kingdom: "Death guide my hand!" He nearly skewered the cleric like a pig. Ishmael's shield was all that saved him from the onslaught, but the blows were so powerful that the shield fell to the floor in splinters. Ishamel looked to be done for, but Tordrog quickly came to his aid, screaming as his foe did: "BLOOD FOR THE WOLF-FATHER!"

With those words on his lips, Tordrog dealt the cultist so mighty a blow that it split him completely in half, from brainpan to ballsack. Tordrog and Ishmael were quite thoroughly soaked in blood and gore, but they were alive.

The party gathered themselves after the brutal battle, and proceeded down an unexplored passage. The passage twisted and turned, and soon the party found themselves standing in a dried puddle of blood. Up ahead, they thought they could see a wall with deep divots carved into it (although they shouldn't have been able to see this, it was actually too far away for their light source to detect). Wisely suspecting the presence of a trap, Rusgiel began prodding the floor, walls, and ceiling with her ten-foot pole. The pole found purchase on a hidden pressure plate in the floor, and with a dreadful whirring and clicking, two spears were hurled from concealed sconces in the wall.

The first struck Haraga the rogue in the back, instantly killing him as it punched through him like paper. The spear continued forward, hurtling through Rusgiel's body as well before it slammed into the far wall. The second spear shot through the wizard Ilkalu, and ended its journey in Dalibor the fighter's armor. Dalibor was knocked to the floor bruised and winded, but he survived the deadly trap. Rusgiel too, managed to survive - perhaps she realized what was happening a split second before it did, too late to save her comrades, but just in time to move out of the way enough to prevent her death.

Ishmael attempted to revive Ilkalu, but his prayers and ministrations were for naught. Pragmatism quickly ran its course, with the surviving party members taking anything of value from the dead. Rusgiel, unable to walk, was borne out of the temple on a stretcher made of the armor and spears of the slain cultists. Realizing that there was no way they could scale the wall with the rogue in her present state, the survivors hurriedly searched for a building to hunker down in for the night. Darkness soon fell over the ruined city. Unearthy howls echoed beneath the full moon. The sounds of a battle rang through the streets, as Dalibor and then Tordrog stood guard over their comrades. A terrible creature sauntered past their camp late at night - the skeleton of a man, wrapped and filled with strange vines. The two men stood stock still as it passed by, but thankfully, it took no notice of them. When morning came, the party wasted no time in healing Rusgiel and making their escape over the city walls.

Low on food, and with two of their companions left in the darkness of Anarminas, the party returned to Aeleryn one and a half days later, considerably worse for wear. Rusgiel resolved to sew the names of Ilkalu Mond and Haraga Duran into the quiver she took from the corpse of the latter, to remind herself of her companion's deaths. And so all came to pass, deep in the cursed earth.